Let's say you go to the grocery store and when you go to pay you find out
that your bank has shut down for the day and you have no access to your funds.
Would you be okay with that? Do you have access to cash for groceries for your
family for 2 or 3 days? If you had to rely on others for transportation, would
you be able to get back to the store? If you had to wait until your next day
off to go to the store, would you have enough food in your house to last until
then?

The families who were affected by the lack of access to their
food stamps were given no chance to prepare for the lack of access - the first
notice they had of a problem was when they went to pay for their groceries. If
they had gone the day before or the day after, they would have had no problems.

People are on food stamps and government benefits because they need
that assistance - and in many states, having cash savings makes you in eligible
for food stamps, making it impossible for them to prepare for an emergency.

@ KalindraYes, I have emergency cash on hand. And food.Anyone who
puts that much faith in our government is a fool.I feel sorry for these
people. They can't (or won't) turn to family, clergy or friends to get
them by for a few days. Have they burned all their bridges? Or are they too
proud? Or are all their family and friends on welfare, too?

Kalindra, I have to say I don't agree with your reasoning. I have
been in this situation, several times, so I feel qualified to comment. I
was always careful to have at least $20 or so CASH put away for a rainy day.
It was difficult, yes, but surely anyone has a dollar or two extra once in
a while to put aside.And people are NOT going to be penalized for having
enough CASH on hand to pay for food for a day or two. I would be terrified to
depend solely on the government to feed my children. I would be afraid of
a situation exactly like this.

@ MrsH.: It's great that you were able to have $20 in your purse at all
times so you could plan for that rainy day. When I was in this situation, I
usually had to use that $20 for gas to get to work, or sanitary products for
that time of month, or diapers for my baby, or soap and shampoo, or laundry
soap, or some other little "emergency" item - usually multiple items.

The people affected by this problem got to the store, loaded their
cart with their groceries, went to pay - and the payment was declined. Even if
they had $20 squirreled away, they probably didn't have it with them. And
$20 really doesn't go very far.

The comment I was responding to
was, "people can't live one day without a government handout?" My
response was - maybe if they had had warning of the problem they would have been
able to work around it, but finding out about the problem when you go to pay
doesn't give you a chance to work around it.

And this problem
affected to poorest of the poor in our country. They probably don't have
extra money lying around.

And in Louisiana, 2 Walmarts were cleaned out of groceries when the system
failed and left many with unlimited balances on their cards! That is theft!
People who use these cards know full well the balance each month. A tweet and
text message went out alerting some users that their cards had no limits, and
instead of doing the right thing, these people who are used to being fed by the
government, went on a spending spree. Reportedly, some had more than 5 carts
full of food, and there have been reports that many of these people were selling
carts full and then going back for more. I hope they are kicked out of the
program for being thieves. Being poor doesn't mean you lose your morals
does it?